Missing

This Story is brought to you by the author of Maggie's Milkman and Extraordinary Rendition, buy now on Smashwords or Amazon. 

To celebrate my 700th post I am publishing an old story. This story was first published in Cambrensis magazine in 2005. 

Dave sat in the bright café with his head in his hands, the picture of his mother looking down at him, smiling. Despite her picture being plastered all over this small town, he was still no closer to finding her. He looked out of the window at the square, idly watching people going about their daily business; oblivious to his pain, his torment.

It was a week to the day since his phone had rung and the nice woman from the travel company had told him of his mother’s disappearance. He didn’t believe it at first; people don’t just disappear, let alone women in their late fifties. But the travel rep had assured him his mother had gone for a walk after dinner and never returned. At first he was angered by their flippant response; the courier had merely reported the matter to head office and the local police, before shepherding the rest of the party onto the coach and shipping them off to the next town on the itinerary. But then the company had redeemed themselves by offering to fly him and his sister out to Portugal if they so wished. He had to go really.

Dave was aware of movement, the waiter laid his coffee on the table, another tiny cup of black tar. He longed for a mug of Nescafe. He cursed for the umpteenth time that day. What the hell was he doing in this place? He didn’t even know if his mother was still there or if she had moved on, whether she was still alive or, he shuddered at the thought, dead. He had checked the two hospitals every day since his arrival, he had been back and fore to the police station trying to deal with the lazy, fat, chain smoking sergeant who was about as useful as windscreen wipers on a submarine. He had gone to all the cafes in the town putting up ‘missing’ posters, asking the punters if they had seen his mother. Nobody seemed to speak English, most just smiled at him and walked on by. No one wanted to help; not so much a wall of silence, more a wall of indifference.

He looked at his mobile phone again; the screen remained the same, just the three letters of the Portuguese mobile company staring back at him. He thought about his sister back home. He wondered how she felt. At least he was doing something even if he felt it was futile. But she was miles away and helpless. But it was her who had insisted that he went and she stayed at home to follow up leads there. He thought about his wife, deserted at a moment’s notice and with little Greg off school with mumps as well. He hoped she was coping and wished he could be back in her arms. He cursed his mother again, he had tried to talk her out of the trip from the outset; a single woman on holiday alone spelled trouble, even on a package tour. But his mother wouldn’t listen to him. She had become a different person since his dad died, instead of mourning his death; she seemed to be reveling in her new found freedom. She had always been a striking woman, her face had aged over the years but gracefully so. Her long blonde hair was greying but still had its character and vivacity. She had looked like an aging Sky newsreader; stylish yet conservative. But since being widowed her dresses had got shorter, her neckline lower and her heels higher.

Dave stared out at the square again, everyone seemed so young, from all directions young men and women walked to and fro clutching files and school books and dressed in black, there was no colour. Why would his mother chose to disappear in this of all places? Where the hell was she? How could no one have seen her? He looked at the female population, there was no one over five foot, everyone had dark, dark hair and big, big bums. His mother should standout a mile, standing at five foot nine, with her slim figure and long fair hair. But no one could recall seeing her. 

His thoughts were interrupted by his phone vibrating angrily on the table. It was actually a phone call, not just a message from his wife or sister back home.

“Yes!”

“Boa tarde Senhor, You looking for your mother?”

“Yes”

The male voice had a thick Portuguese accent.

“I think I saw her. A British woman was in Bar Gardo Bravo around midnight every night this week. I haven’t seen her there before. She looks like the picture on the poster, a little.”

“Thanks…”

The line had gone dead. Dave was beside himself, a week of nothing and now something, okay it was a bit vague but it was a real lead. Something to give him hope, He smiled for the first time in a week. Should he phone his sister? Best not to, it might come to nothing, best not to get her hopes up. He looked at his watch. 4.30. He decided to get back to his pension for a little while to get some rest. It might be a long night. He left a Euro on the table and headed down the Avenida.

The time dragged, He couldn’t sleep, the caffeine rich coffee had seen to that. He restlessly watched television, idly flicking through the fifty channels at his disposal, occasionally stopping at something that caught his eye before setting off again. His mind raced with the excitement and the problems of potentially seeing his mother again.

What was he going to say to her? How should he approach her? To his shock Dave realised he had kind of been hoping she was dead. In a way death would be easier to cope with than disappearance. Death was final, but if she was still alive, there were so many unanswered questions; where had she been? Why hadn’t she contacted them? And then how would he respond? Could he cope with the knowledge that he had been rejected by his own mother?

He climbed the steps up towards the old Cathedral and the bar he had been instructed to go to. The barmy spring night and exertion of the climb brought little droplets of sweat out on his forehead. The strains of Fado escaped from a nearby bar, butterflies danced in his stomach. He stood outside the door of Bar Gardo Bravo took a deep breath and went inside.

From outside it had seemed so tranquil but now inside, he was nearly deafened by the techno beat thumping from the speakers. The bar was poorly lit, strobe lights flashed and screamed in front of his eyes. He bought a beer and looked around. He had the feeling he was being stitched up. There was no way his mother would come to a place like this. He could feel the sweat dripping down his back, If he felt old in here, his mother, twenty odd years older, would feel ancient. He carried his beer over to a vacant table and sat down scanning the nearly deserted room.

As his eyes became accustomed to the dark he saw her, sitting opposite, staring straight at him, his mother; or was it? In the disco lights he couldn’t quite tell. She definitely wasn’t Portuguese, he could tell by her height and her fair hair. But her hair was short, a short bob, and her skirt was short too, surely too short for his mother to wear. And who was that man she was holding hands with? Well, not so much a man, more a boy, twenty five tops.

Dave drank his beer slowly, staring at the woman in front of him. She kept glancing over at him, well aware of the attention. Surely if it was his mother, she’d come over to speak to him. A strobe light lit up her features, no, it wasn’t his mother, she was too young, too pretty, but then the boy said something to her and she laughed, throwing her head back, a mannerism of his mother. How could he sit in a bar looking at a woman and not know if it was his own mother? He watched as she reached out for the cigarette packet, it couldn’t be her, she didn’t smoke. The circumstantial evidence suggested it wasn’t, but still he couldn’t be sure.

What now? Should he go over there? What if it wasn’t her? How stupid would he look? Well, what was there to lose? But then what if it was her?

He took another mouthful of beer, the more he watched her the more he was convinced that it wasn’t her. He wasn’t looking at a woman of fifty six, she was more his age. But then she moved her hand, or turned her head, little actions so familiar to him, surely so unique to her, that they made him think that maybe, just maybe it was his mother.

Without warning the couple rose from their seat. Dave was paralysed. He watched open-mouthed as they headed towards him. Were they coming to talk to him? The woman, looked over, smiled a warm smile and then they turned and headed for the door, the boy’s hand slipping round the woman’s waist.

Dave zipped up the suitcase and sat on the bed. He was heading home. He had seen all he needed to see. His mother was safe and well and happy, that smile had told him that. He was now convinced it was her. He didn’t know what he would say to his sister yet, but he would cross that bridge when he came to it.